James Herriot's Dog Stories Read online

  Ted got up suddenly. ‘Any road, somebody ought to tell ’im. Ah’ll explain it to ’im.’

  He crossed the room. ‘Are ye ready for another, Albert?’

  The old shepherd glanced at him absently then indicated his glass, empty again. ‘Aye, ye can put a drop i’ there, Ted.’

  The cowman waved to Mr Waters then bent down. ‘Did ye understand what Mr Herriot was tellin’ ye, Albert?’ he shouted.

  ‘Aye . . . aye . . . Mick’s got a bit o’ caud in ’is eyes.’

  ‘Nay, ’e hasn’t! It’s nowt of t’soart! It’s a en . . . a en . . . summat different.’

  ‘Keeps gettin’ caud in ’em,’ Albert mumbled, nose in glass.

  Ted yelled in exasperation. ‘Ye daft awd divil! Listen to what ah’m sayin’ – ye’ve got to take care of ’im and . . .’

  But the old man was far away. ‘Ever sin ’e were a pup . . . allus been subjeck to it . . .’

  Though Mick took my mind off my own troubles at the time, the memory of those eyes haunted me for days. I yearned to get my hands on them. I knew an hour’s work would transport the old dog into a. world he perhaps had not known for years, and every instinct told me to rush back to Cop ton, throw him in the car and bear him back to Darrowby for surgery. I wasn’t worried about the money but you just can’t run a practice that way.

  I regularly saw lame dogs on farms, skinny cats on the streets, and it would have been lovely to descend on each and every one and minister to them out of my knowledge. In fact I had tried a bit of it and it didn’t work.

  It was Ted Dobson who put me out of my pain. He had come in to the town to see his sister for the evening and he stood leaning on his bicycle in the surgery doorway, his cheerful, scrubbed face gleaming as if it would light up the street.

  He came straight to the point. ‘Will ye do that operation on awd Mick, Mr Herriot?’

  ‘Yes, of course, but . . . how about . . . . ?’

  ‘Oh that’ll be right. T’lads at Fox and Hounds are seein’ to it. We’re takin’ it out of the club money.’

  ‘Club money?’

  ‘Aye, we put in a bit every week for an outin’ in t’summer. Trip to t’seaside or summat like.’

  ‘Well it’s extremely kind of you, Ted, but are you quite sure? Won’t any of them mind?’

  Ted laughed. ‘Nay, it’s nowt, we won’t miss a quid. We drink ower much on them do’s anyway.’ He paused. ‘All t’lads want this job done – it’s been gettin’ on our bloody nerves watchin’ t’awd dog ever since you told us about ’im.

  ‘Well, that’s great,’ I said. ‘How will you get him down?’

  ‘Me boss is lendin’ me ’is van. Wednesday night be all right?’

  ‘Fine.’ I watched him ride away then turned back along the passage. It may seem to modern eyes that a lot of fuss had been made over a pound, but in those days it was a very substantial sum, and some idea may be gained from the fact that four pounds a week was my commencing salary as a veterinary surgeon.

  When Wednesday night arrived it was clear that Mick’s operation had become something of a gala occasion. The little van was crammed with regulars from the Fox and Hounds and others rolled up on their bicycles.

  The old dog slunk fearfully down the passage to the operating room, nostrils twitching at the unfamiliar odours of ether and antiseptic. Behind him trooped the noisy throng of farm men, their heavy boots clattering on the tiles.

  Tristan, who was doing the anaesthesia, hoisted the dog on the table and I looked around at the unusual spectacle of rows of faces regarding me with keen anticipation. Normally I am not in favour of lay people witnessing operations but since these men were sponsoring the whole thing they would have to stay.

  Under the lamp I got my first good look at Mick. He was a handsome, well-marked animal except for those dreadful eyes. As he sat there he opened them a fraction and peered at me for a painful moment before closing them against the bright light; that, I felt, was how he spent his life, squinting carefully and briefly at his surroundings. Giving him the intravenous barbiturate was like doing him a favour, ridding him of his torment for a while.

  And when he was stretched unconscious on his side I was able to carry out my first examination. I parted the lids, wincing at the matted lashes, awash with tears and discharge; there was a long-standing keratitis and conjunctivitis but with a gush of relief I found that the cornea was not ulcerated.

  ‘You know,’ I said, ‘this is a mess, but I don’t think there’s any permanent damage.’

  The farm men didn’t exactly break into a cheer but they were enormously pleased. The carnival air was heightened as they chattered and laughed, and when I poised my scalpel it struck me that I had never operated in such a noisy environment.

  But I felt almost gleeful as I made the first incision; I had been looking forward so much to this moment. Starting with the left eye I cut along the full length parallel to the margin of the lid then made a semicircular sweep of the knife to include half an inch of the tissue above the eye. Seizing the skin with forceps I stripped it away, and as I drew the lips of the bleeding wound together with stitches I noticed with intense gratification how the lashes were pulled high and away from the corneal surface they had irritated, perhaps for years.

  I cut away less skin from the lower lid – you never need to take so much there – then started on the right eye. I was slicing away happily when I realised that the noise had subsided; there were a few mutterings, but the chaff and laughter had died. I glanced up and saw big Ken Appleton, the horseman from Laurel Grove; it was natural that he should catch my eye, because he was six feet four and built like the Shires he cared for:

  ‘By gaw, it’s ’ot in ’ere,’ he whispered, and I could see he meant it because sweat was streaming down his face.

  I was engrossed in my work or I would have noticed that he wasn’t only sweating but deadly pale. I was stripping the skin from the eyelid when I heard Tristan’s yell.

  ‘Catch him!’

  The big man’s surrounding friends supported him as he slid gently to the floor and he stayed there, sleeping peacefully, till I had inserted the last stitch. Then as Tristan and I cleaned up and put the instruments away he began to look around him and his companions helped him to his feet. Now that the cutting was over the Life had returned to the party and Ken came in for some leg-pulling; but his was not the only white face.

  ‘I think you could do with a drop of whisky, Ken,’ Tristan said. He left the room and returned with a bottle which, with typical hospitality, he dispensed to all. Beakers, measuring glasses and test tubes were pressed into service, and soon there was a boisterous throng around the sleeping dog. When the van finally roared off into the night the last thing I heard was the sound of singing from the packed interior.

  They brought Mick back in ten days for removal of the stitches. The wounds had healed well but the keratitis had still not cleared and the old dog was still blinking painfully. I didn’t see the final result of my work for another month.

  It was when I was again driving home through Copton from an evening call that the lighted doorway of the Fox and Hounds recalled me to the little operation which had been almost forgotten in the rush of new work. I went in and sat down among the familiar faces.

  Things were uncannily like before. Old Albert Close in his usual place, Mick stretched under the table, his twitching feet testifying to another vivid dream. I watched him closely until I could stand it no longer. As if drawn by a magnet I crossed the room and crouched by him.

  ‘Mick!’ I said. ‘Hey, wake up, boy!’

  The quivering limbs stilled and there was a long moment when I held my breath as the shaggy head turned towards me. Then with a kind of blissful disbelief I found myself gazing into the wide, clear, bright eyes of a young dog.

  Warm wine flowed richly through my veins as he faced me, mouth open in a panting grin, tail swishing along the stone flags. There was no inflammation, no discharge, and the lashes, clean and dry, g